MICHELLE LUBERTO/THE HOYAWorld Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim spoke on the connection between economic development and an improved response to Ebola, the first event of the newly launched Global Futures Initiative.

World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim delivered a lecture on the role of economic development in improving the pandemic response against the Ebola virus outbreak at Gaston Hall on Tuesday as part of the inaugural lecture series sponsored by the university’s Global Futures Initiative.

The lecture, entitled “Lessons from Ebola: Toward a Post-2015 Strategy for Pandemic Response,” marked the launch of a series of presentations hosted by the initiative on the topic of “The Global Future of Development,” which will continue throughout the semester with one more lecture from Kim and two lectures from World Bank Senior Vice President and Chief Economist Kaushik Basu.

University Vice President for Global Engagement Thomas Banchoff inaugurated the lecture series by emphasizing the importance of the university’s role in addressing global issues.

“In addressing global issues, we want to build out the model of an engaged global university in service to the world,” Banchoff said. “We are in the position to convene structured conversations with world leaders like today’s. Conversations that address not only practical questions of power and interest in survival, but also ethical imperatives of justice, peace and the global common good.”

University President John J. DeGioia said that Kim’s leadership experience in tackling a variety of global issues embodies the spirit of the Global Futures initiative.

“The Global Futures Initiative seeks to understand [global] challenges, find new ways for us to connect and work with other people and ultimately to live out our university’s characteristic ethos — to seek the betterment of humankind,” DeGioia said. “There is perhaps no one better to inaugurate this initiative … than Jim Yong Kim.”

Kim began the lecture with a call for increased efforts in fighting Ebola by stressing the severity of the pandemic in both its death toll and its effects on the global economy.

“The Ebola outbreak has been devastating in terms of lives lost and the loss of economic growth in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone,” Kim said. “We need to make sure that we get to zero cases in this Ebola outbreak. At the same time, we need to prepare for future pandemics that could become far more deadly and infectious than what we have seen so far with Ebola.”

Kim then attributed the failure of the global community in achieving a sustainable solution to Ebola to a lack of concern for the affected countries.

“It is part of what I would call a very long history of low aspirations in providing health care for poor people,” Kim said.

In arguing for developed economies to take a greater role in fighting Ebola, Kim argued that such a course of action would be both morally and economically sensible.

“Not only is it the right thing to do morally, not only is it the right thing to do in terms of making a preferential option to the poor, it’s also economically important,” Kim said. “Those of us who have been working in poor communities for a long time argue that it’s the right thing to do morally, and maybe it would even be the right thing to do economically.”

During a question-and-answer session after Kim’s remarks, three students asked Kim for his opinion on fossil fuel divestment, in light of the Committee on Investments and Social Responsibility’s recent vote against complete divestment at Georgetown.

Kim responded by acknowledging the complexity of balancing environmental values with economic priorities in his own work at the World Bank.

“The divestiture issue is a complicated one,” Kim said. “Often divestiture means that you’re going to have to take a big haircut and lose some value of your investments, and that means less money to invest in students like you guys. It’s a problem that’s so huge, which is also juxtaposed with problems like the need for energy for poor people, that it’s going to take everyone working together.”

Hee Yoon Hang (COL ’18) found Kim’s approach on fighting the Ebola crisis through economic development to be innovative.

“Jim Yong Kim’s lecture was an inspiring one. I was most surprised by the way he approached the Ebola issue, as well as other world health problems,” Hang said. “It was about the people, their behavior and thinking, which aren’t necessarily the first things we think of when faced with global problems like this. I learned that seeing the world as it is is the first step to making tangible improvements in our world.”

Rachel Villanueva (SFS ’16) agreed that Kim’s application of psychology in understanding the global response to Ebola was effective.

“I think what really resonated with me was Dr. Kim’s use of mental models as a framework for understanding how low aspirations in providing healthcare for poor people affected responses to the Ebola outbreak,” Villanueva said. “I think it really shows the power of perceptions and attitudes in treating pandemics and improving the health care infrastructure.”